State New York Financial News

Stronghold Digital Mining (SDIG), a crypto mining company in Pennsylvania, is turning waste from old power plants into energy to power hundreds of Bitcoin mining rigs.

The market capitalization of gold-backed crypto tokens increased by 60% in 2022 to surpass $1 billion for the first time in history, according to Arcane Research in its latest weekly report. 

Publicly traded crypto mining company HIVE Blockchain Technology has signed a deal to buy ASIC chips from semiconductor manufacturer Intel that will be used in their new custom mining devices.

Crypto trading volumes using Ukrainian hryvnia (UAH) as the fiat currency have fallen to nearly their normal levels, despite banking restrictions in Ukraine making fiat transactions in the region increasingly difficult. From Russia, however, crypto trades using the Russian ruble (RUB) still remained well above their normal levels on the crypto exchange Binance this week.

A New York State proposal to suspend fossil fuel-powered proof-of-work mining for three years across the state has gained support from two more Assembly members.

Data from blockchain-analysis firms show that Russian denominated crypto purchasing and trading on major exchanges have faltered, debunking theories that the country will pivot to digital assets to circumvent sanctions. 

New York state’s efforts to enforce sanctions against Russia have ramped up a gear with the Department of Financial Services, or DFS, expediting the procurement of additional blockchain analytics technology.

LSEG bought a stake in London-based Nivaura in 2019.

LSEG bought a stake in London-based Nivaura in 2019.

The US Mayor who became known in the Cryptoverse as a Bitcoin (BTC) supporter and industry ally is now opposing crypto mining, citing high energy consumption. Meanwhile, a billionaire urges the state to get rid of BitLicense "right away."

Alexis Abell recently walked out of a BJ’s Wholesale Club outside Buffalo, N.Y., with 24 boxes of Kraft Macaroni & Cheese, a box of 50 frozen mozzarella sticks, a 40-pound bag of basmati rice and a 12-can pack of garbanzo beans.

The “solid gold cube” crypto promo that surfaced in New York this week has turned out to be hollow on the inside, with onlookers online lampooning the stunt as an appropriate critique of the extravagant promises of crypto and blockchain tech.

With roughly nine months until major federal and state elections, New York State gubernatorial candidate Jumaane Williams is making crypto mining an issue in his campaign, criticizing the lack of regulatory clarity.

The global cryptocurrency market capitalisation rose 1.55 percent over the last 24 hours to $1.73 trillion while the trading volume over the same period skyrocketed by 1,06,435.67 percent to $79.22 trillion.

cryptocurrency market eroded its gains on Thursday to trade lower following rate hike signals by the Fed at its next meeting. The central bank would steadily remove support for the economy in order to fight high inflation. Barring the US dollar-pegged stable coins, all other eight out of the top-10 digital tokens were trading lower during the trade on Thursday. Bitcoin and Ethereum shed more than 2 per cent each, whereas Terra dropped 7 per cent. The global crypto market cap dropped more than 2 per cent to the $1.62 trillion mark. However, the total crypto market volume rose more than 22 per cent to $103.97 billion.

Bitcoin. The ballooning popularity of Bitcoin and other digital currencies has given rise to a strange new political breed: the crypto mayor. Eric Adams, New York's new mayor, accepted his first paycheck in Bitcoin and another cryptocurrency, Ether. Francis Suarez, Miami's mayor, headlines crypto conferences. Now even mayors of smaller towns are trying to incorporate crypto into municipal government, courting startups and experimenting with buzzy new technologies like NFTs to raise money for public projects. Their growing ranks reflect the increasing mainstream acceptance of digital currencies, which are highly volatile. «Mayors rationally want to attract high-income citizens who pay their taxes and impose few costs on the municipality,» said Joseph Grundfest, a business professor at Stanford. But as with many ambitious crypto projects, it's unclear whether these local initiatives will ultimately amount to much. So far, most are either largely symbolic or theoretical.

Bitcoin (BTC) is a New York state of mind thing for Eric Adams, the crypto advocate serving as the 110th Mayor of New York City. He received his first Bitcoin payout on Friday during some epic downward price action, and was unflappable when asked about losses during an interview. 

On Monday, UK Parliament launched a cross-party group of MPs and Lords to cover the crypto and digital assets sector. The group is to act as a forum for parliamentarians, policymakers and the UK crypto sector to discuss policy and regulation in the industry. The news followed last week’s announcement that the New York State Department of Financial Services appointed former Promontory executive Peter Marton as deputy superintendent of virtual currency. Marton commented that “Crypto supervision should be a marathon and not a sprint, and I look forward to continue this effort in earnest.” Fed Chairman Jerome Powell also stoked excitement on Tuesday, stating that a highly anticipated report on cryptocurrencies and CBDCs will be released “within weeks” (though originally scheduled for a September 2021 release). Powell made the statement during a Senate Committee hearing, where Senator Pat Toomey also questioned whether the Fed has authority to act as a retail bank for Americans, asking: “It seems to me that there is absolutely nothing in the history, the experience, the expertise, the capabilities of the Fed that lends the Fed to being a retail bank. Is that a fair observation?” Powell responded: “I would say, yes.” Having previously stated that a CBDC would render privately issued stablecoins to become obsolete, he also told Toomey during the hearing that it is possible the two could co-exist.

With US cities such as Miami and Austin trying to court digital asset companies, John Wu was unsure whether to make New York the permanent home of his cryptocurrency and blockchain start-up Ava Labs - until Eric Adams was elected mayor last year.

The conviction of Ghislaine Maxwell capped a month-long trial featuring sordid accounts of the sexual exploitation of girls as young as 14.

The British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell was convicted Wednesday of luring teenage girls to be sexually abused by the American millionaire Jeffrey Epstein.